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Author, blogger, and civil rights and anti-war activist David Mixner offers a personal reflection on faith and the fight for social justice. Here's an excerpt:

I have to continue with the battle until I can't lift my head any longer. Not because I am special or indispensable but because I am one of you and each and everyone one of us is needed. By continuing to embrace life, I am one more voice that refuses to be silenced until our children can live in total freedom.

After all Archbishop Romero believed that sin was simply to do nothing in the face injustice, war and poverty. My 'fellow travelers' in life always have been those who believe the Archbishop's words:

Peace is not the product of terror or fear. Peace is not the silence of cemeteries. Peace is not the silent result of violent repression. Peace is the generous, tranquil contribution of all to the good of all. Peace is dynamism. Peace is generosity. It is right and it is duty.

The fact of the matter is, it doesn’t matter whether or not you think homosexuality is a sin. Let me say that again. It does not matter if you think homosexuality is a sin, or if you think it is simply another expression of human love. It doesn’t matter. Why doesn’t it matter? Because people are dying. Kids are literally killing themselves because they are so tired of being rejected and dehumanized that they feel their only option left is to end their life. As a Youth Pastor, this makes me physically ill. And as a human, it should make you feel the same way. So, I’m through with the debate.

Here, [Tony Campolo, evangelical pastor and author] shares the story of a late-night phone call from a mom about a deeply theological question ... and the reason she's asking breaks his heart.
At 0:49, he shares the story. At 3:42, he talks about the thing that always forces us to think differently. And at 4:19, he rebuts perhaps one of the most commonly used refrains about homosexuality in church.

Hat-tip to Pastor Robert E. Shore-Goss of MCC in the Valley, North Hollywood, CA.

Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas presided over a pep rally, telling the crowd at the Values Voter Summit that President Barack Obama fears them and that conservative believers can turn back the tide of liberalism. Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky expounded at length about the threat to Christianity and the West from radical Islam. And Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida pledged fealty to Jesus Christ and the American dream, while making sure never to mention immigration reform.

Jonathan Martin on The New York Times' Caucus blog reports that Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) and Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) met this week with religious right leaders. An excerpt:

A group of longtime Christian conservative activists are holding a private meeting Thursday in Washington to hear informal presentations from two of the most talked-about potential Republican presidential candidates: Senators Ted Cruz of Texas, and Rand Paul of Kentucky.

“This is not a fundraiser, nor an endorsement of U.S. Senator Rand Paul or U.S. Senator Ted Cruz, just a great opportunity for you to get to know them and discuss your ideas and views with them and hear of their lives, faith, and respective vision for our nation,” wrote Robert Fischer, a South Dakota-based conservative organizer, in an emailed invitation to dozens of evangelical Christian leaders.

The gathering is being held in conjunction with the Family Research Council’s Values Voters conference, an annual gathering of Christian conservatives in Washington, but it is not an official part of that event. Rather, it is being staged by a loosely-organized group of Republican leaders that call themselves “Conservatives of Faith.”

The hosts include Tony Perkins, the head of the Family Research Council, the former presidential candidate Gary Bauer, the conservative talk show host Janet Parshall and Richard Viguerie, the direct mail pioneer, along with a handful of others from the conservative movement. Mr. Fischer is the group’s chief organizer.

Peter LaBarbera, president of Americans for Truth About Homosexuality (AFTAH), has fallen in love with Judy Meissner’s term aberrosexualist, which he says is “is certainly more accurate than‘gay’ and more comprehensive than homosexual.” If that is true, aberrochristian is far more accurate when referring to bigots like LaBarbera than the term Christian.

Today begins the Faith & Freedom Coalition‘s three-day “Road to Majority” conference, designed to bring millions of evangelicals to the polls next year. But hidden away in today’s agenda is a massive lobbying effort including hundreds of Tea Party evangelicals knocking on the doors of their U.S. Senators and Congressmen today, demanding a replacement law for what everyone expects to be a Supreme Court ruling that DOMA is unconstitutional.

The resolution also calls on the Boy Scouts to remove from executive and board leadership the individuals who earlier sought to allow gays as both members and leaders without consulting the many religious groups that sponsor Scout troops.

Putin, who has embraced the Russian Orthodox Church as a moral authority and harnessed its influence as a source of political support, has championed socially conservative values since winning a six-year third term in May 2012.

The 60-year-old president denies that Russia discriminates against gays but he has criticized them for failing to increase the country’s population....

Activists say violence against homosexuals has increased since Putin returned to the Kremlin after four years as prime minister and that it is being fuelled by the bill and other aspects of his conservative agenda.